Book contents
- Byron in Context
- Byron in Context
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Contributors
- Chronology
- Abbreviations and Note on the Text
- Introduction
- Part I Life and Works
- Chapter 1 Early Years
- Chapter 2 The Years of Fame
- Chapter 3 Exile
- Chapter 4 Texts and Editions
- Chapter 5 Byron and His Publishers
- Chapter 6 Piracies, Fakes and Forgeries
- Part II Political, Social and Intellectual Transformations
- Part III Literary Cultures
- Part IV Reception and Afterlives
- Further Reading
- Index
Chapter 3 - Exile
from Part I - Life and Works
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 October 2019
- Byron in Context
- Byron in Context
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Contributors
- Chronology
- Abbreviations and Note on the Text
- Introduction
- Part I Life and Works
- Chapter 1 Early Years
- Chapter 2 The Years of Fame
- Chapter 3 Exile
- Chapter 4 Texts and Editions
- Chapter 5 Byron and His Publishers
- Chapter 6 Piracies, Fakes and Forgeries
- Part II Political, Social and Intellectual Transformations
- Part III Literary Cultures
- Part IV Reception and Afterlives
- Further Reading
- Index
Summary
Byron rehearsed going into exile in 1809, when he was twenty-one years old. Before setting sail for Lisbon, he wrote, “I leave England without regret, I shall return to it without pleasure. – I am like Adam the first convict sentenced to transportation, but I have no Eve, and have eaten no apple but what was sour as a crab and thus ends my first Chapter” (BLJ 1: 211). Byron’s sardonic perception of himself as a biblical exile foreshadowed the allusive character of his second longer-term exile at the age of twenty-eight, when his carefully staged exit required an audience (some of the same friends and servants), expensive props (a replica of Napoleon’s carriage) and a literary precursor. On his last evening in England, Byron visited the burial place of the satirist Charles Churchill, and lay down on his grave. It was a performance of immense weariness with life and solidarity with an embittered outcast.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Byron in Context , pp. 31 - 37Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019